The Perils of Hiking Near Forks
by Damn Straight it's Saira
Summary: After a boy goes missing while visiting Forks, his heartbroken and inconsolable girlfriend follows, desperate to know what happened to him. Set three years after Breaking Dawn. R&R etc.
1. Prologue

**So this is basically the stripped down, revised, revived, rewritten and all around better version of a shitty Fanfiction I did a few years ago.**

**I wrote most of this last year, but never got around to posting it, so the first few chapters should be steady, but after that, who knows.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own shit, save Poppy, Ian and the storyline, so don't sue me or anything, dig?**

Prologue

It only took me one moment to decide to leave New York City for Forks. One second I was desolate and grieving Ian, and the next, I was determined and on my computer buying plane tickets. I barely looked at the price as I paid online. The next flight to Seattle left from JFK in three hours, and I would be on it.

I grabbed my suitcases and threw the first things my hands fell on. I packed most of the clothes I had with me; I didn't know how long I would be staying. I whirled around my old bedroom in my parent's house, collecting anything I might want, moving with barely a thought. I grabbed pants, shirts, shoes at random, and only as a second thought did I grab the stack of books on my bedside table and throw them on top. I paused at my dressing table, picking up the little necklace with the pressed flower inside Ian had given me three years ago. My eyes pricked and my throat choked up with tears before I got a hold on myself again. I wouldn't cry again yet. Not until I got there.

It was just as I was walking out of the front door of the old brownstone that had been in my mother's family for generations that I remembered to call my mother. I dialed her cell phone number quickly as I hailed a cab.

"Poppy?" My mother answered. I barely cringed at the name now.

"Hi, mom. It's kind of spur of the moment, but I'm going to Forks."

"What? Poppy-"

"Hold on. JFK airport, please," I instructed the driver before I spoke to my mother again. "I've made up my mind. I've got my tickets already and I don't just want to sit around the city anymore. I need to do something, go somewhere, and Forks is definitely a somewhere."

"But honey, I don't want you staying alone right now. That's why you're staying with me in the first place, remember?"

"I'll be fine, mom, really."

There was a pause on the other line before my mother answered. "Could you wait until I get home to say goodbye, at least?"

"Could you meet me at the airport? My plane leaves in a few hours."

"Okay, Poppy. I'll meet you there in twenty minutes."

"Alright, mom, see you then." We hung up and I closed my eyes and leaned my head back on the seat. I wouldn't cry yet.


	2. Chapter One

**Disclaimer: Again, I don't own Twilight or its parts, only Poppy and Ian.**

**And um, sorry the chapters are so short; the next few are all about this length, as well. Whatevs. They'll get longer eventually. Probably.**

Since I had bought my tickets so last minute, there had been no first class available. I wasn't used to these tiny seats in coach. I wriggled around trying to get comfortable in my aisle seat as the plane gracelessly met with the Port Angeles tarmac. The stewardess was telling us not to unbuckle our seatbelts until we had reached a full and complete stop, be careful when opening the overhead compartments, articles inside may have shifted during flight.

I wasn't listening.

I was reliving parts of the conversation my mother had had before we said goodbye at the airport.

"_When will you be back?" she asked._

"_I'm not sure. I suppose it depends upon what I find when I get there."_

As I got off the tiny plane, I realized that I had no idea what I was going to do. I wouldn't need to support myself, fortunately; thank God for old New York families and old New York bank accounts.

It was only just after six o'clock in the afternoon, but with the time difference between New York and Washington, it felt to me like nine. I had taken a seven-hour flight directly from JFK to Seattle, and then another hour flight from there to Port Angeles.

"_What are you going to do in Forks?"_

"_I don't know. I'm going to look for Ian."_

"_Honey, I know you don't want to hear this, but if they haven't found him yet…"_

I rented a little dark green '98 Saab from the airport and asked the man behind the counter if he knew of any hotels in Forks. He said he knew a few and gave me precise directions to one of them. I thanked him and went on my way.

As I left the airport, the sky darkened from the somehow golden blue of late afternoon to the blue-purple-pink-orange of sunset. As the sun got lower in the sky, I began to notice how chilly it was getting. I turned the heat on in the car, marveling at how it could be this cool in the middle of August.

It took almost an hour on the highway to get to the town limits. As I neared the town itself, I began to realize how exactly opposite of my city this little place was. In August, New York was loud, hot, dirty and colorful.

Forks was eerily quiet, cool, green, and yes, dirty, but dirty in a completely different way. Where New York was dirty from pollution and sludge and rats, Forks was dirty purely from, well, dirt. Dirty from Nature. The town, empty-looking and blue-green-brown, appeared sad.

"_If they haven't found him yet…"_

Or perhaps it was just my mood.

I noticed the exit I was supposed to take to get to the highway and moments later I stopped the car at a small and brown motel just off the highway; I could still see the few cars rushing by through the relatively thin layer of trees. There were so many _trees_ here. I was accustomed to the scarce rarity of green, and yet I could barely see much else here between the far-spaced and small buildings.

After checking in and retrieving my bags from the car, I found my room. Number seventeen. I opened the door and turned on the lights. By this time it was completely dark outside. The motel room was standard, cheap and sparse. It was clean, thankfully. I recognized that I had been expecting worse without even realizing it, and the fact that it was not so was immensely relieving.

As soon as I sat down on my bed I realized the extent to which I was exhausted. It was quite an extent. I quickly changed into my pajamas and fell into bed without even brushing my teeth. I was sleeping like I'd been awake for a week within moments of lying down.

"_If they haven't found him yet…"_


	3. Chapter Two

**Disclaimer: I own the rights to nothing but Poppy, Ian and some copies of the Twilight books.**

I became conscious and very confused at the same time. I had been dreaming. I tried to remember what the dream was about, but all I remembered was a vague feeling of dread and desperation. Then I realized that I wasn't in my bed. I didn't know where I was. I opened my eyes, but really it was the rain on the roof that brought everything back. I was in a scrappy motel in Forks, Washington, the rainiest town in the United States.

As I lay in bed I decided that today I would begin looking for Ian. Or at least find out what happened to him. After all, that was what I was here for. Or was it? I didn't really know why I was here. But I was, and I wanted to make the most out of it. I just didn't know where to start. First things first, I thought, to get dressed.

Black jeans, black tee-shirt, grey sweater, tan heels, grey coat, I wasn't one for astounding color in my wardrobe. I searched for the address I needed in the phonebook in my room and left the motel.

Now that it was daylight I saw the posters. There were vibrantly multi-colored missing persons posters hanging in every few trees and on the bulletin board outside the main office. I walked to one and stared at the picture on it. A beautiful smiling boy, a wide mouth and loving eyes that looked flat in monotone though I knew that they were deep and beautiful brown in life, Ian Newton grinned out at me. I recognized the photo. It had been taken of him and I just a few months ago, during the summer, before he came to visit his grandparents here in Forks. I had been cropped out, of course; they weren't searching for me.

And now that I was here, I could keep my promise to myself; I let my tears fall freely down my cheeks and drip from my chin. I yanked the fluorescent green paper from its staple and brought it into the car with me. I set it in the passenger's seat and stared at Ian's wrinkled green paper-face for a moment longer before starting the car.

I drove around and ate breakfast at a small diner in town before I went my first try at getting any kind of information about Ian's disappearance. As I drove I saw Ian's face flash by in a million colors before I pulled into the driveway of the quaint house.

As I parked, got out of my car and walked to the door I steeled myself for the meeting I was forcing myself into. I'd never met Ian's family from Forks, and now I would, under the worst circumstances. I knocked on the door after a deep breath.

A relatively attractive man answered the door. He couldn't have been more than a few years older than I, making him most likely Ian's cousin Mike. He had light blue eyes and disheveled blond hair and a slightly boyish face. He looked confused, startled that he didn't recognize me. I hadn't yet grasped the small-town dynamic, I supposed.

"Can I help you?" he asked me.

"Hello. Is this the Newton residence?"

"Yeah," the man still looked slightly confused, now though, I assumed, by the conversation so far.

"I'm Penelope McCoy. I'm Ian's girlfriend. I, well, I don't know. I wanted to meet his family, I suppose. I wanted to know if there is anything you could tell me that I don't know."

"Oh." The man looked taken aback at my presence here, as could be expected. "Um, come in. I'm Mike. Ian was my cousin. You're the girl he lived with, right?"

"I am, yes."

"He talked about you a lot. You came up to Forks all the way from New York City?"

"Yes. I just want to know anything you might be able to tell me about what happened. I didn't really get much information."

"Oh. Well, let me find my grandmother. She knows more about it than I do. You can sit if you want to."

"Alright, thank you." I sat down on a small couch in the small living room as Ian's cousin left the room. I heard muted voices just before Mike and an old lady walked through the same door Mike had moments before. She was aged and slightly withered with thick glasses perched on her nose, but she did not in the least look as if she were not all there. She had a demanding presence, even dressed in a faded sweatshirt with a cat staring out of her chest. I stood up to greet my host as they walked in the room.

"Grandma, this is Penelope McCoy. She was Ian's girlfriend and she came here to ask us some questions. Penelope, this is my grandmother, Florence Newton."

"You may call me Florence. How do you do?" Florence Newton reached out to shake my hand as she spoke. She didn't smile as she greeted me.

"I'm well, thank you," physically, at least, I didn't say as I sat back down. Mike and Florence took their seats on the couch across from me.

"So, you were Ian's girlfriend?"

"I am, yes." I would not refer to Ian in the past tense as they did.

"So what do you want to know?"

"Anything. I didn't get much information. His parents couldn't tell me very much. They got too upset every time I asked about anything."

"Understandable," said the old woman before beginning the story I felt my life depended on yet I knew so little of. "I suppose you know that he came to stay with me here in late July. He was going to stay for only a few weeks and then return home to New York.

"A few things he really did love about this town were being able to hike through the rainforest and going to the beach down at La Push. La Push is the Indian Reservation out on the coast. Usually he went with Mike or one of the other cousins, but this time he went alone down to one of the trails. It was around noon on August second, I think, and he said he'd be home for dinner. Cell phones don't work deep in the woods where he had gone, so we couldn't call him when he was late. When he still hadn't come home the next morning, I called the police. They sent out a search party. Got all of the family involved, most of the town, too, and a number of young men from La Push helped as well." She stopped for a moment and took a breath.

"After three days of looking for him, I think it was one of the Quileute boys, they found some of his clothes, his jacket, shirt, scarf all ripped up and bloody. The police and doctors said that from the looks of it, Ian probably had lost too much blood to last long in the woods, especially without a jacket. It gets cold at night, even in the summer."

No one said anything for a long time. I had known some of this, he went hiking and never came back, but I hadn't known the details until now.

"Thank you," I whispered once I'd gained control of my voice again. Florence nodded in reply.

"I guess that's all I needed." I stood up. I knew the politeness required me to stay longer, ask about how they were doing, if I could help in any way, but in my head I thought 'Fuck politeness,' and I left soon after.


End file.
